Picture Book
by Taz4407
Summary: Pre the reunion scene in AWE. Elizabeth Young William have a nice evening on the beach and Elizabeth shares a little story with him...


Disclaimer: Based on characters and situations from Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. All franchise characters are the property of the Disney Company and no copyright infringement is intended. I am in no way associated with the Disney Company.

Many thanks to Eliza C. for betaing this.

**Picture Book**

The day had been a fine one for Elizabeth and William; a trip to the market in the morning, a visit to Mrs. Danforth - William's watcher when Elizabeth had need of one, and a small sailing lesson in the late afternoon. After all was done that needed to be, the day led them to their current destination - out on the beach enjoying the peaceful twilight hour. It was here they spent many an evening, letting the warm night winds of the Caribbean wash over them, as the waves played their song, and the sun and sky painted on their nightly canvas. At present Elizabeth sat on a piece of drift wood watching William, his back to her, attempting to dig a hole to "world's end," as he put it. Kneeling on his knees he was scooping out the sand with his bare hands but ever so often, would reach for the good sized shell he carried around with him, using it as a shovel of sorts. Supposedly, there was only one way to reach the enigma of world's end but William had decided he was going to discover another; he was going to tunnel there. Never mind it being true in that there was just one passage in existence because when an eight year old formulates a different idea, it is done.

"Oh!!" A disgruntled cry pierced the air.

"William, what is it?"

"My hole just filled with water and I was so far too!" William groaned all in one big heaping breath.

Elizabeth had a good chuckle as William moved to another spot to start over, even more determined than before.

"Father, don't you fill this hole up too!" William hollered at the sea, like someone was really there to hear him, as he again began to dig- sand flying in every direction.

This was not the first time, nor by any means, the only time, had she heard him talk to the sea this way. Elizabeth's mind began to flow back to the very first occurrence, which came one afternoon not but a week shy of his fourth birthday. William had been building a sand castle, when suddenly a rouge wave came in and crushed his creation. Elizabeth then observed as he promptly stood up, marched to the water's edge, straightened himself to his full height of three foot eight and in his mightiest, most serious voice proclaimed, "FATHER!" After which he broke into a fit of giggles, and began splashing happily about in the surf. Elizabeth had nearly burst into pieces out of sheer joy, mixed with sheer amazement, at what she had just witnessed. Nothing quite like it had ever happened before, at least that she had taken note of. He talked _abou_this father here and there, though never in completely concrete terms or actions. Due to this, Elizabeth, when William was small, had never been exactly sure how he viewed Will. She wondered if the specific connection she greatly hoped for was being made by him. There was no need to wonder anymore. Her immediate urge was to run over, scoop him up, and give him a big squeeze, but in the end, she had held back thinking it may potentially embarrass him and ruin the moment. He_ would_ say something directly to her when and _if_ he felt like it, so she stayed in her spot and continued to watch him in the surf. After words, she never ceased to be amazed by all the small and unique ways William possessed - and was continuing to come up with to build his own special relationship with the father he had yet to physically meet. Still to this day it never failed -on every occasion she would feel a mist begin form in the corners of her eyes and her heart tranquilly expand with boundless pride and love.

Elizabeth was abruptly brought out of her reverie by a glob of wet sand colliding with her arm.

"Sorry, Mother…" came a halfway muffled apology since William's head was, more or less, completely submerged in the new hole.

Elizabeth merely laughed and sent a sand ball soaring in his direction, landing on his back with a soft splat. In response William lifted his head out of the hole, gave his mother a toothy smile, and then went right back to work. For the first time, Elizabeth took notice that the light was now almost completely gone and accordingly let her eyes up drift to the cosmos. The sky's picture book was fast revealing itself to the world of night. Since she was a small girl, Elizabeth had secretly enjoyed gazing upward to find the stories written in the stars. There was mighty Orion who hunted Taurus the Bull but fled from Scorpius. A big and little bear romped about but also served as dippers and guides. Tonight, her stare, as it did most every time, came to rest on one formation in particular.

"What are you looking at up there, Mother?"

Elizabeth broke her gaze and reached a hand out to her son.

"And did you make it?" She affectionately breathed brushing a strand of wet hair out of his eyes.

"No, not yet. I ran out of light and my hands got really tired." William sang out holding up two very grimy sand caked hands to go with an equally, if not even more so, filthy set of clothes.

"Yes, well you were digging awfully intently." Elizabeth smiled.

"Oh, you wait I'll really make it next time, I _will_!" William confidently proclaimed, arms flailing wildly and displaying an even toothier grin than before.

"Here…" Elizabeth leaned forward to brush his clothes off.

"Mother!!" William exclaimed, not at all pleased to be cleaned off - given that being messy is a quite revered thing in childhood. Elizabeth simply raised an eyebrow and began her task. After one side was completed she made a twirling motion with her right forefinger and William turned heel to finish being de-sanded as best could be done. Inwardly Elizabeth was having a grand time. There was no real need to do this, but it was just too good an act to pass up. William twirled back around and, faster than cannon fire, hid his hands behind his back. He was at least going to keep them triumphantly dirty.

"Oh, come here." Elizabeth bemusedly chuckled as she extended her hand out again -which William, after a halt of slight suspicion, took being pulled into a hug.

"Ok, so what _were _you looking at?" William, who was now sitting next to Elizabeth, inquired for the second time.

Elizabeth contemplated, for a very brief moment, pointing to a different cluster of stars so as to keep hers a mystery for the time being. However, the moment expired on the breeze and she lifted her arm to help guide him to the subject in question.

"Do you see that group of stars there?" she softly breathed.

"You mean the little cup looking one, I mean the uh, uh little dipper?"

"No, no, look down a bit and to the right."

"I still don't see it," he was beginning to get displeased with himself.

Elizabeth motioned for William to stand in front of her. He got up and for the second time whisked his hands away and out of site.

"Silly, I'm not going to clean your hands off, now come here." Elizabeth smiled and shook her head in amusement at his resolve.

William let out a tremendous sigh of relief and took up his post as directed. Taking his arm, Elizabeth placed hers over his, so they were both pointing in the same direction.

"Now do you see?"

"I think so," he answered, although he was still somewhat puzzled.

Elizabeth decided she was going to make him use his head instead of plain telling him whether he was right or wrong this time. That and she was interested to see his answer.

"Ok, then trace it for me," she encouragingly stated.

William put on a look of minor annoyance at this. After all, he had been working very hard all evening on a project of great importance. Giving it another assessment he figured it smarter to play along - lest a bigger wave should come in to make him. With Elizabeth's arm still over his, he concentrated and drew what to him seemed like turned around sideways and stretched out "M".

"So, did I get it right?!" He beamed.

"Yes, William you did," Elizabeth beamed back.

"_Now_ are you going to tell me why you were staring at it all dreamy like?" William was quite interested in getting to the bottom of this. He had an inkling it was about his father.

"Well, you see, that is the constellation Cassiopeia. According to ancient myth, she was a queen of a far off land, who was so self indulgent and petty that her people tired of it and chained her to the sky."

William frowned and was clearly not completely buying this explanation.

"I have to tell you what it really is first," Elizabeth grinned. "Anyhow, when I was a young girl, I used to read books about these things and secretly study the sky at night -secretly because, you see, your grandfather Weatherby thought it – well, he claimed he thought it improper for a girl of my station to study such things. Those subjects were for sailors and pirates and I was too be neither." Elizabeth wondered if William caught the irony in this.

"Grandfather knew didn't he," William knowingly reasoned wanting to make sure his thought was correct.

"Yes, he knew all right, he just wanted it to seem like he didn't, but anyway, you remember how I met your father? On the crossing to Port Royal…"

"He was blown off his ship after cranky old Captain Baboonsa attacked it and when you saw him, jumped around like a wild monkey and screamed,' there's boy in the water!!' so loud that the whole world could hear it," William enthusiastically relayed before she was able to get another word out.

Elizabeth brought her hand up to her face in mock indignation but then her faux dramatics transformed into a broad smile; for she always greatly enjoyed his versions.

"One night, a couple days after I… I mean we, rescued him, I wasn't able to get any sleep - so I went up top to be in the fresh air. As it turns out, your father was not sleeping very well that night either. He was having bad dreams about the wreck, so _I_ thought if I shared what I learned from my books, _maybe_ he would feel better and not think about what had happened for a bit, so he could get some rest," Elizabeth felt her voice wanting to waiver a tad but held it back. William was nodding his head in approval to continue.

"So, we sat there looking up and learning until we came to this one and I told him pretty much, exactly what I told you."

"He didn't believe you, did he? I just know it," William giggled.

"No… not really, but it is true about the myth, he was right though, by then I had made up my own shape for it, but I was not about to let him know it," Elizabeth's tone was soft and sweet.

William, whose eyes had been darting from the sky to Elizabeth and back again, swiftly made the correlation to what she was saying.

"It was a W for father's name. That's what you thought it looked like and why you didn't tell!" William more or less screamed, quite pleased he solved the mystery. "And I bet he came up with a funny looking E, but wasn't going to tell either."

"William, you are too smart for your own good," Elizabeth mused ruffling his hair and lightly rubbing his back. "He claimed he saw two triangles without bases."

William let out a loud snort and broke into laughter. Father can be very silly can't he?"

"Sometimes…" Elizabeth was laughing too.

"When did you both find out what you really saw but wouldn't tell?"

"It was after crazy ol' Jack escaped from Port Royal and things settled down a fair bit. We had taken a walk and came to this beautiful clearing atop a cliff. At one point, we just sort of became lost in our own thoughts, and ended up staring at the same thing. That was when we told each other - even though, yes, we both already knew." Elizabeth finished with a manner of warm and loving remembrance, but also a hint of there being a bit of something more.

"Mother, I bet he's looking at it right now. Oh, I do bet he is," William blurted out. "And he's thinking of us…" At this, his voiced dropped slightly and he leaned in closer to her embrace.

Elizabeth shifted to look their son straight in the eyes with devoted, understanding intensity and uttered not a word as she stood up - gently steering William by the shoulders to leave. The hour was late, and it was time to go get ready for sleep. As they walked William quietly diverted to the remains of his hole, pausing them for an instance to take in the sea once more before heading back up the lane. He did not have to say it for there was no need. Elizabeth understood; William was going to add this to his little ways.

Latter in the night, as she was slipping out of William's room from tucking him into bed, she heard a fond goodnight wished to the treasures in the sky.

R.T.


End file.
